It's a Girl's World -- And Lilly wants Adventure

[Slyvena]

Sly there's a note box in H42

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Cheers. Fixed.

I don't like how there wasn't any focus aid in the last chapter towards the undercover agent

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You have a meta-magician stationed in the home, further protections based outside and an alert Watch nearby. They're not getting anywhere close to your family unless they somehow have access to a power potent enough to overwhelm or subvert those protections whilst also not being good enough as to have been moved somewhere more useful to Lord Waters years ago.
I'm not saying it can't be done, just that you'd have be abysmally unlucky.

Did we almost invert [Brave Blood] back when we got {Sharp Note}

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I've mentioned the Shatterheart Malignancy right? Can't remember.
You were not close to Inverting [Brave Blood], but you were close to outright killing yourself. Lilly will probably get a good look at that when she takes the time to start analyzing the structures within her soul. Your Lack of Oath makes that harder right now. You're like a System Admin with full permissions who doesn't know how to open a Word Doc.

The Noosemen don't work for the local kingdom's government, they work for the overarching superpower. And that... guy whose name I forget... who tested Lilly's powers? Sounds like HE works for them too, right?

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The Ministry of Lore is under Narisell's jurisdiction. A town the size of Harmuph wouldn't even tithe one person every year, the overwhelming bulk of their work is internal administration.
But yes, they are the ones that directly contact the Noosemen. Because if Lira has to waste their own time finding you then terrible things happen to those who didn't report it.
-
Meeting with Lore Warden - Arrone training Worthy
Guiding the Watch south - Tithe Worthy
Captain Martin's gathered information - Worth risking it all for.
-
You are on record to be Tithed at 13 now, the Captain hid your true potential but you displayed far too much power for anyone to assume you were not tithe material.

The realisation that your entire family is about to be murdered and the only one standing in the way is a girl you resent for being more favored than you would do wonders to put things in perspective

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It even has to some extent. He never would have been so honest with Lilly if the Lord Waters and Wolves situations hadn't just happened. It could also backfire (If you struggle with thinking your sister is better than you and that is proven right, that isn't exactly going to make you feel better).

Zach's a mess right now. He loves Lilly while at the same time projecting a lot of his insecurities onto her all while lacking the self-awareness and vocabulary to understand exactly why he feels they way he does. Lilly makes him feel bad, and it feels like that should make it her fault somehow, even if he can't fully bring himself to believe that.

Could Lilly/Evie possibly use Subversion on the Rapid Iterator?

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QM knowledge: "Muh ha ha."

Most importantly. No Ruffles Interlude?? Forget defying nobles, or dodging the Tithe. That's the real crime here.

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Ruffles was too good and pure for this world. The God's conspired to send her away to a better more wholesome universe. Thus with the departure of Ruffles, the balance between Good and Evil tilted toward the darkness and so it was that the 6th Era ended. /totescanon
Stay on the lookout for my spinoff quest 'Ruffles: Best Dog in Equestira' /totesreal

That... must have been rough for Yolun.

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It was a bit of an issue when your mother put the foot down on that particular name. But Nights Lillies are also a symbol of finding peace after tragedy and moving on, which is the context Yolun choose to roll with. You were his chance to do things right and honour his sisters/mother's memory.

@Slyvena so, uh...Before we descend into a paranoia spiral, can you tell us if this is a continuity error or actually Secret Challenge 3?

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Sorry, continuity error. My notes were 'died roughly the same time'. I'll reword 1.6 to make it clear he quickly followed his mother.
She caught it and transferred it to Jeremy before it was caught.

 

[IceCold]

She caught it and transferred it to Jeremy before it was caught.

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Also by the way Madam Silva's manservants's name in 1.5, was named Jeremy too. You might want to change his name if Myah's going to become more important.

 

[Alcor]

Well, there goes my "Actually, we've misread the situation, Jeremy is the Essence Vampire, Myah has been sheltering/helping him - possibly gaining a memory tampering Ethos out of a desire to help protect him, and the moment Lilly got tampered with was after she said she couldn't help with evading detection because it was an Ethos thing - there was a bit about her expression showing worry when she was otherwise projecting anger there." theory that I was building!

And perhaps the best shot I'll ever have at getting a Secret Challenge. Back to the drawing board it is.

 

[TheBiggerFish]

I've mentioned the Shatterheart Malignancy right? Can't remember.

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Yeah, you did mention it. So, there's soul cancer and that's not anything to do with Inverted Ethea. Good to know?

Sorry, continuity error. My notes were 'died roughly the same time'. I'll reword 1.6 to make it clear he quickly followed his mother.
She caught it and transferred it to Jeremy before it was caught.

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Ah. That's...okay, it's good, and it's bad. Good because we don't have anything mucking with our head that we know about. Bad because there's still the out of left field thing! Aaah!

 

[Slyvena]

Ah. That's...okay, it's good, and it's bad. Good because we don't have anything mucking with our head that we know about. Bad because there's still the out of left field thing! Aaah!

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I mean the way it all clicked together was so good I almost considered making it true, but alas, twas not to be.

Happens quite a bit where you guys throw out some crazy idea and I'm like "Hmm, I like that better than what is actually happening... oh well"

 

[Zaealix]

...Out of left field?...
Wait.
Mass-murdering mad noblechild. Rape-reversal Blood child. A dude set to turn the land against him with that advisor who relies on enemies to gain foreknowledge of the future...
Hrrrm.
Suddenly I'm wondering if the villian trio are going to swing back in all at once, in a rather unpleasant manner- With that Semus guy being well placed to potentially info-hazard the bloody reflector. IDK for sure how well he'd work against Valerie Voice, but she's giving me major 'I have a trump card, I'm invincible!' feels that says she's totally going to get sucker-punched if someone hits her with a simmilar 'surprise sucker!' power...
...
Also, a thought: Is Lord Waters an Essence Ethos? That whole 'preps the land' thing SOUNDS pretty in the ball-park for Essence type-Ethos, and it fits with the 'nascent Dungeon Superweapon' theory someone else threw out, and also explains those space-warping Stags. The Rosebush in general explains the stuff the Wolves did...

 

[TheBiggerFish]

...I swear, if the out of left field thing is "Senus Marnic is interested in us because of our connection to the Flower"...

 

[Deuterium Dawn]

Was that revealed in Act 1?

 

[TheBiggerFish]

Was that revealed in Act 1?

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Honestly I'm just spitting out whatever pops into my head in the hopes that it works.

Speaking of which...How does Mathew's {Illusory Fighter} actually work? It sounds like he's doing some sort of weird counterfactual stuff that would be more in the domain of nega-Concordance than anything else...

 

[Deuterium Dawn]

[X] [FonL] Just dropping in on someone in the middle of the night and unloading all our amazing new powers on them after they've been suffering for weeks is not exactly normal behavior, nor is it likely the best response. We just saw how envious of us Zach is, so let's try to approach Myah with some more tact. We've seen how weird Essence looks around Myah and since then have massively improved our Essence perception. Let's take a moment to investigate first before we stroll into her home and offer help, check if we can see what essence links there are inside the house and between Myah and other people (or if Myah is even home in the first place). Chances are high that she has an Inverted Essence Ethos or is being affected by one, so we'll want to investigate first before we blindly trust what she says. Once we've done that, we can try to wake her up and talk to her to find out what's wrong and how we can help.
[X] [WiT] Go to Madam Silva and use your favour in return for an explanation on how Divination works and its common limitations.
[X] [Bfig] Dissolution <- Undoing the world.
[X] [Bfig] Imposition <- Creating the world.
[X] [Bfig] Relations <- Entwining the world.
Not as 100% convinced Relations will help with Zach as some people but I'm willing to take a chance and it should be generally useful. I don't think D/I will help against Valerie, much as I'm looking for something that will, but I do think they might help against Waters and his "lord of the land" schtick, which is why I'm pointlessly approval voting for them.

[X] [TaM] Golden Rapture
[X] [TaM] Whispers of Life
[X] [TaM] Collective Communion
[X] [TaM] True Song} (Investigate Repairs
[X] [TaM] Rest State
[X] [TaM] Subversion

We have a ridiculous number of powers already and it's only going to get worse. Dream has been our powerhouse so far, so I'm always interested in pushing it further, but the other 3 have all been extremely useful as well.

[X] [TT] One question a day, or whenever I feel my reserve has become completely full. (Default+, how the Ladder has been working but tweaked to not waste potential when at full reserve. Operates best at pre-warning of long-term dangers.)
[X] [NGC] Target the problem at its source. Sit down with Zach and your parents and explain to him that your father never loved him less even if he did hurt him unintentionally. Explain what he was trying to do with you and why he was so worried. Then sit down and explain what's going on with your ethea, what might happen to Zach, and what you can do about it if it does.

Not the best wording, but none of the other answers seem to address the root issue here. Even if we can't avert the IE, at least addressing the underlying issues might help with the mental stability that will soon be so sorely taxed.
[X] [NIV] The Lantern's Eye: "Find Penelope" (2 Years Ago, West Narisell)

@Alectai
Can you explain what you're trying to get at with the AC vote in your plan? As written it doesn't make sense to me and even what I think you're getting at doesn't seem very practical. While remote observation powers definitely exist, "bugs" probably don't except in a literal, eyes-of-the-familiar sense. While there's undoubtedly ways to obscure or block powers like Silva's, the only way we're likely to have access to them in the immediate future is through the watch, which would necessitate letting someone follow us around and actively alert them to when we wished to be hidden.

Honestly I'm just spitting out whatever pops into my head in the hopes that it works.

Speaking of which...How does Mathew's {Illusory Fighter} actually work? It sounds like he's doing some sort of weird counterfactual stuff that would be more in the domain of nega-Concordance than anything else...

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I think Slyvena called it out as a Freeform Oath effect? Which would make it

Freeform Oath Wielders tend to prepare discrete packages of effect often based around reflection, piercing or synergy that can be applied to their allies.

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[sheep-dodger]

I really want to encourage @Alectai to add at least a step of cursory information gathering to the Myah write-in, like mapping out essence flows in Myah's house before we go in. We have no idea what exactly is going on in her family and odds are high that we're dealing with a recently inverted ethos, so just taking Myah at her word on everything seems very unwise to me.

 

[Alcor]

Hmm, well, since I've been stewing on the matter of Lilly's name a bit after my mistake review I started wondering if there's more we can put together to the story there. I don't feel great about this being Secret Challenge related because I feel like the general idea is nothing new to us, but with the Ethea explanations perhaps we can fill in some details.

We know Lilly's mom says she isn't the one who picked Lilly's name, "It" did. She further tells us that we'll know what name our daughter will have. She also is directing us to go to the hillock with the Night Lillies and then once we go there all this stuff will be revealed to us, including why we mustn't throw our life away and also that it's "Something we can never escape from, the doom of us all if it doesn't get what it wants."

So I think the working theory most of us have is that this is The Flower and I agree, but I think Martin's infodump may have given us some additional insights into the nature of this. I'm thinking the exact nature here is an Oath (perhaps Deific/Oath). Oaths are about forming contracts and can be made with outer plane creatures. I'm thinking at some point, somewhere in Lilly's maternal ancestry, a Contract was made with The Flower (assuming it is indeed the "It.") What was gained from it then, I'm not sure, but the price demanded from The Flower was the name of the firstborn daughter and the continuation of the bloodline for whatever ultimate purpose it has. In support of this theory, the Oath Rank Up mentions "leave soul-effects residing latently in material or immaterial spaces." That's why she says we have to head to the hillock, it is one of those places, possibly the very spot the Contract was first formed and so just by being there we'll have the rest of the pieces come in.

Our mom's concern is that if we violate the terms of the Contract (by, for instance, dying early before continuing the chain of daughters) something Very Bad will happen. If it's indeed The Flower we're talking here, it certainly would seem to be an entity capable of causing a ton of damage if it wanted to. Might partially explain why Evie was curious about why Flower was fighting for Lilly despite the effort seemingly far outweighing the benefit. Lilly as an individual may not be "worth" the cost it was expending, but whatever long-term project involved in this Contract may well be.

Looking at the spreadsheet, the very first 1.1 listing, before we even picked up [Dream] has most of our sources struck out. Of the very few that even have a listing we've got Essence Awareness (Inner and Outer) at SL, Mana (Innate Source) at L, ...and Freeform Oath (Innate Source) at a high M on the border of H. (And Maw at L due to the events of the chapter.) ...That can't be a coincidence, can it?

 

[TheBiggerFish]

<idle musing>...Why is Will in capital letters, back in the Ride to Harmuph segment?</idle musing>
Wait.
Wait.

It's also capitalized in our Entities vote option.
Is...Is everything a dungeon? Just that the world is then bigger and more complex due to the time spent?

This is probably not related to the thing, is it.

 

[Edifier]

[X] [FonL] Just dropping in on someone in the middle of the night and unloading all our amazing new powers on them after they've been suffering for weeks is not exactly normal behavior, nor is it likely the best response. We just saw how envious of us Zach is, so let's try to approach Myah with some more tact. We've seen how weird Essence looks around Myah and since then have massively improved our Essence perception. Let's take a moment to investigate first before we stroll into her home and offer help, check if we can see what essence links there are inside the house and between Myah and other people (or if Myah is even home in the first place). Chances are high that she has an Inverted Essence Ethos or is being affected by one, so we'll want to investigate first before we blindly trust what she says. Once we've done that, we can try to wake her up and talk to her to find out what's wrong and how we can help.

[ x] [TaM] In thy Likeness
[ x] [TaM] Riemannian Geometer
[ x] [TaM] Ply the Line
[ x] [TaM] Imposition of Intent
[ x] [TaM] Contention Prognosticator
[ x] [TaM] Melded Carapace
[ x] [TaM] Objective Awareness
[ x] [TaM] Stray Vector
[ x] [TaM] Subversion

[ x] [TT] Whenever I feel the cost would be low, avoiding high cost questions. (more frequent short term advice, less effective at long-term ramifications and unforeseen domino effects)

• I think getting lots of advice to solve short term problems will be useful. One of those delicate short term problems being Zach, another Myar. What is more, we now have Contention Progostinator which will warn Lilly of dangers both long term and short term. These situations need us to navigate trough a needlepoint. So setting the throttle to answer lots of short-term questions will do wonders for making our own fate, a fate where our brother has an inverted ethos and works to protect us.

[X] [NGC] Target the problem at its source. Sit down with Zach and your parents and explain to him that your father never loved him less even if he did hurt him unintentionally. Explain what he was trying to do with you and why he was so worried. Then sit down and explain what's going on with your ethea, what might happen to Zach, and what you can do about it if it does.

[X] [NIV] The Lantern's Eye: "Find Penelope" (2 Years Ago, West Narisell)


[x] [Bfig] Imposition <- Creating the world.
I think Imposition is the most powerful of the lot. It jailbreaks our existing powers, lets them act beyond their limitations. Like it'd be possible to add a prolonged rest state on our allies, usually, it would collapse on its own but with imposition, it would linger. Or even change their biology to something closer to our essence one and then impose it to make it permanent.
It's also building the towering edifice dungeon within our dream.
It'd also work well with Cleaver of fortune to allow it to do more stuff and break a few of its limitations, impose Fate of our actions and desires on the world. Cleaver of fate already does that to a slight degree, and with imposition, it could be made an upgraded to a moderate degree.



On reading the thread, Myah having an inverted ethos was mentioned by Alcor, and that wasn't counted for the secret challenge. I suppose it's not it. And I was so sure it'd be the third secret.

Spoiler: Reasoning Myah's inverted ethos as the secret challenge, blindside.

I started thinking about the third secret challenge, blindsiding... new information. Hmm.
Our Deific ethos has 2 if not more inverted ethos effects. I firmly believe that inverted Ethos are culturally shunned, they are forced to be villains since anyone found with them are killed on sight. Yet they are a more direct manifestation and embodiment of the powers. What is more is that we have confirmation that culture affects ethos, like [Service to Man] is very much influenced by culture. There is influence from the superior state as well.

I believe the third secret, the one that could blindside us.
Myah has an inverted ethos.

She has an ethos, no? And we know that if it's too powerful the noosemen take you and enslave you. Her desperate need to escape, and now her death. Well, it's a grim picture. She has an inverted ethos.... considering the public opinion on it... it's gonna fuck her up. And a new weak inverted ethos will unlikely be good enough to overpower pops.
She knows stuff, like needing a way to circumvent diviners to escape. She may have a concordance type, maybe flow, maybe she's just smart like that. I think father wouldn't kill her if she had a normal ethos that was concordance and revealed that she'd get enslaved, but if it was her having an inverted one and she knew it then she would need to keep up the pretense.
Her death I suspect is when she gambles with revealing her secret to father.

"-You ran." Myah states, cutting you off. There is a strange sort of confidence passing over her now, an excitement that you can't place. "But how did you trick the Diviner? How did you make sure they couldn't find you," her expression changes to one of confusion as she continues, which incidentally is exactly how you're feeling. "But… then why did you come back? Did it stop working?" she questions.

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"Yeah, okay Lilly. Sure." You can practically feel the sarcasm dripping off her. Which makes Myah's next shift all the more jarring when she steps close to you to whisper conspiratorially "But could you do it again? Make it stick this time? I know we haven't hung out for a while-" that last part is said with something you think is sadness "-but this is important Lilly. Is it your Ethos? What would it take? Please?" Her voice grows more tight and strained the longer she speaks.

Myah's asking for something you don't have and can't give. You reach out and touch her shoulder to say "I'm sorry Myah, but I can't- oh" you pause as you watch your own natural energy begin to billow and slough off yourself in thick currents, a stream flows out and onto Myah. As this happens the odd pallor around her is saturated and scoured, coming to resemble what you would consider an ordinary appearance.

Myah for her part is equally distracted, breathing a sign of deep relief as your natural energy blankets her. You pull back your hand and the flow quickly peters out. You muse that you are in fact doing a terrible job at 'not make people ask questions' as you notice Myah's energy slowly start to pale once more. Whatever the strange effect, it was temporary. Myah's relief turns to some sort of hard expression that you can't read.

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Just as her scarlet framed figure disappears around another corner and out of sight, you note that her natural energy has finished its return to the same off-putting state as before.

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Myah is afraid you'll find out the truth that no one is allowed to know. Will become angry as an attempt to deflect your suspicion unless you punch her in the face right now.

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Something no one is allowed to know, inversion is a kill on sight thing.
The information that we have over her ethos, like I can't make sense of this effect. And info on inverted ethos is highly unreliable. Maybe that was an reaction with inverted Essence, or maybe it was an inverted flow, maybe it's something to do with inverted concordance. Could even be an inverted oath like our knowledge stealing but with essence, tho I dunno if it'd have that odd interaction with our power.

Actually, I think she is an essence vampire. An inverted Essence ethos.

She paints quite the distinctive picture, tittering the balance between herself and her heavy load, careful not to step on the wrong parts of the rough road that would break her tenuous balance and send her sprawling. Myah's hair is a deep maroon that flows in rivulets down and off her shoulders nearly to her waist. That detail is less than a year old. Her hair brown before her awakening, some consequence of her Ethos. All this aside you couldn't really fail to spot her anyway, what with the sparser throng of people and the still strikingly odd quiver of her Natural Energy as it lifts off her lithe frame.

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Or maybe it's inverted Pith, since mutations are attributed to that... but we ourselves changed a lot from our ethos.
Could be deific too, since our deific has inverted applications like subversion which is an inverted oath power.

Another piece that can link to the third secret is how Flow is needed to wake up a mind. Our 3 month long sleep. Perhaps going to commune with the tree has the same kind of risk, even tho essence wise we are fine and understand we won't be able to wake up.

Hmm, can the dungeon target pops with a flow spell? Or have left something like that in him.

 

[Faraway-R]

Service to Man (Lesser):
A choice available to any young woman who has not betrayed the expectations of her culture. As an unmarried virgin of good standing within your community, the path of the maiden is available to you as it is to all other such female youths. You honestly can't think of anything worse than to live and die a housewife, living vicariously through the achievements of your children. Still, such a choice would be the perfect option to deliberately cause others to ignore you and look no deeper. Service to Man is the choice women with no better option take, allowing others to assume it was the best you could attain could do wonders for the goal of being left alone. Unless of course your father decides to marry you off immediately, that could cause all kinds of problems.

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It's your mothers Ethos. Among other things, you know it somehow helps your father be a better carpenter and apparently if your mother administers medicinal herbs to your father it works better than if any other person used them on him. Her Ethos also grows slightly whenever your father's does. In essence she has tied her fate to his.
You don't know much else about it, despite the fact that about half the women in Harmuph have it as their chosen Ethos. Choosing Namesake has a pretty big stigma for women too, a lot of people will assume its because you couldn't 'qualify' for Service to Man.

It should make our skin crawl. Lilly only finds the idea mildly uncomfortable (mostly because of babies), because indoctrination is a thing. Though I'm sure you will all lead her to develop a far more nuanced viewpoint.

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Liatris Silas [[Bloomling]] |Integration Vector:: [Service to Man]: Flow :: 41st Growth

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Flow:
I know very little about Flow. Baring specific approved Ethea, when discovered, they are not allowed to remain in Harmuph for any significant length of time. Flow is the aspect of the mind, Psionic Power.

A Psion is able to interact with something called 'The Construct' and perceive the 'Wakes' of living beings' consciousnesses. Frankly I think they are terrifying and I'm not exactly displeased that so little abide in Harmuph, save for worrying about what use they are being put to elsewhere.

When fighting a Psion… well first of all try not to. Try and set something up that allows you to attack them from an incredible distance away or which allows you to ignore as much of their existence as possible. If at all feasible, your first instinct should always be to simply run. I know from personal experience that Psions can warp even the most good-natured of people into absolute monsters given enough time. Until you or I know more about Flow, I'd avoid dealing with powerful practitioners of the Psionic art regardless of if they seem to be friend or foe. You can't trust your own thoughts or perceptions around them

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"It's the Wake," The Captain says slowly when he sees he has your attention, "You said you have not gained access to the Flow, I'm impressed you could pull him into sleep with essence alone, but returning someone to consciousness after this long will take more than just a jolt of life."

"What will it take," you demand.

"Time. The Wake will re-establish itself in a couple hours on its own. I've seen it in men we have to sedate for more than a day. The mind pulls inward, takes a while to reach back out."

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So.

A peculiar thought I had here.

Why not ask our mother to have her help our father wake up?

Once upon a time, we abandoned Service to Man without much regret or thought. Unsurprisingly so. Buuuut...

Look at what Not!Lilly revealed - our mother's Ethos is on level 41 if I am correct - and more importantly it is aligned to Flow. Even more importantly it is also aligned to assist our father specifically. So why not use it?



Now, this practical claim aside, here is a bit more. And it ties into the fact that I think we never actually were given any explanation about what being a Lesser Ethos entails. As I remember what we were told about Ethos rarity is we were told that Common Ethos does not necessarily mean weak, with a specific example of a woman performing epic feats with one. Also, look at Lilly herself - her own Dream within the Forest is Common - and yet, that Ethos alone would make her an Auron par excellence and someone to be Tithed.
Moreover, we were told that higher rarity of an Ethos typically means specialization rather than potency.

There was no explanation on what a "Lesser" Ethos means, though. I found that odd and this feeling has only gotten stronger.



Now look at both the QM explanation on Service to Man - that fully half of women in Harmuph get it - and then at Captain Martin's explanation of what Flow Ethae entail. Look at how he told us that there are very few people with Flow Ethae that are allowed to remain, how few there are in Harmuph... 25% of the entire population is few? Doubt.

It's as if he isn't aware that Service of Man is Flow-aligned. And certainly we haven't known our mother to read minds... But this discrepancy makes the mystery of Service to Man and Lesser Ethae in general stand out all the more.

 

[Edifier]

Yeah. Yeah. Waking mom up to wake up pops. There is the thing about the dungeon having used flow in the past, so there is a slim chance it could have done so to pops as well.
Service to man is flow, so it could work out.

Wait. Service to Man is a flow ethos? A very pervasive flow ethos. Service to the superior states, the ones where the tithe flows. Hmm. This is a crazy thought but could service to man be a subordinate ethos to another flow ethos, like ruler of men? The vassel ethos act according to the superior ethos advantage, collect knowledge and pass it on. Or carry out the orders from a distance or unknowingly.
He said that you can't trust your own actions or thoughts around flow ethos. Yet as you said, Service to Man is one of the most common ethos in circulation. Yet it was noted that there are almost no flow ethos in Harmuph.
Could the tithe take away all other Flow Ethos to hide this? Or take them out of circulation to assure this setup is undisturbed.

Tho service to man seems to have one aspect be that of the overlooked maiden. Hmm. But I can't imagine it'd be that powerful. It has the stacking of boons aspect to it, improving dad. Probably a form to debuff as well.


I am wondering if Lilly should stop being as noticeably beautiful she is. Go back to looking like she first appeared when walking through Harumph. When meeting with someone like the seer, or even Myar.

 

[Imugi]

I thought you had some monstrously powerful Ethos. A new Divine Avatar despite the heavenly wars being long passed.

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Apotheotic Ethos? A person becomes a Divine Avatar if they choose an Apotheotic Ethos?

This process is highly regulated, in our long history a quite expansive list of approved entities with reasonable contractual demands has been compiled.

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Is Ev'aclliál anywhere on that list? Or one the disapproved list

Some Entities are powerful enough to outright lie, and if you do not know their True Name then they can present in meeker less threatening forms to entice carelessness in a contracts wording and terms.

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In a way sounds like something Ev'aclliál could do or did to Lilly. How does knowing their True Name help if its too profound to retain, like with Ev'aclliál? Her true name is gone from Lilly's mind.

Flow: |Blank|
- I know little of this, save that an Inverted Flow Wielder is the end of thought. They are often only tracked by following the trail of bodies as direct observation is usually obscenely difficult.

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Sounds similar to how Valerie and Aboleath are going about things.

 

[sheep-dodger]

Is Ev'aclliál anywhere on that list? Or one the disapproved list

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with how important she was in the End of the First Era interlude I'm gonna guess that she's most likely not on the former and probably on the latter, and we should probably not ask because how do we explain that we know her name in the first place?

Now look at both the QM explanation on Service to Man - that fully half of women in Harmuph get it - and then at Captain Martin's explanation of what Flow Ethae entail. Look at how he told us that there are very few people with Flow Ethae that are allowed to remain, how few there are in Harmuph... 25% of the entire population is few? Doubt.

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[Service to Man] is probably not treated as a ""proper"" Flow Ethos, since it most likely needs a lot longer for its effects to take hold and effect changes compared to more powerful ones, it is after all meant for long-term partnerships and the rearing of children, so it probably has its effects take hold over the course of months and years rather than hours or days.

Edit: with Liatris' [Service to Man] Ethos at level 41 she should have at least one level of {Abstraction} btw, we should ask her at some point what it does for her.

 

[esktasy]

[I Tear The Veil] was Oath. Hmmmm.

I wonder what [My Beautiful Pain] would have been. Maybe Pithe?

 

[Simon_Jester]

Sounds similar to how Valerie and Aboleath are going about things.

Click to shrink...

Valerie isn't running on inverted Flow, though. She's "difficult to track except by following the trail of bodies" in the NORMAL sense of just being very good at killing people who won't be immediately missed and leaving no one in a good position to report where she's gone. She's not doing anything that a very badass Pithe user couldn't do instead, on the strategic level anyway.

Inverted Flow Ethoi let you basically cognitohazard your way through entire territories, erasing or irreparably damaging the minds of everyone you encounter. That's a whole 'nother level of "hard to track."

 

[Edifier]

Valeries sounds like inverted Oath to me.

Oath: |Non-consent|
- Not much to say here. The Oath Wielder becomes driven to inflict their will on others, despising autonomy and free choice. Their powers become a twisted version of before, piercing into unwilling beings as easily as a knife through air. They also tend to become obsessed with self-modification, eventually binding themselves into a mess of Oaths so tangled that their soul withers away onto nothing.

Click to shrink...

It has everything. Self-modification, removing, removing autonomy from others, non-consensual mind control. Oath is also noted to be the power primarily used by demons. And Aboleth, he is a demon. what if it isn't inverted at all, what if it's just a deific, apothetic, non-inverted power?

On a segue of demons and angels. Hmm. I was wondering. Pith, Pith is someone from the side stories and as happens the description of power says it's tapping into a bigger being. It matches expectations. All its design is sourced from that being and I think that Pith was an angel.

 

[Simon_Jester]

The distinction between an apotheotic 'normal' Ethos sourced from a malicious entity, and an apotheotic inverted Ethos, may be largely academic.

 

[darknessworld]

The distinction between an apotheotic 'normal' Ethos sourced from a malicious entity, and an apotheotic inverted Ethos, may be largely academic.

Click to shrink...

It all depends on how strong Mannoth is, because I doubt most divine beings would work with him to make what are probably their strongest means to interact with the mortal world.

 

[Deuterium Dawn]

So.

A peculiar thought I had here.

Why not ask our mother to have her help our father wake up?

Click to shrink...

Because he's going to wake up in a bit on his own and she's still pretty stressed? It's not impossible her ethos can do this but it's not certain either.

Now look at both the QM explanation on Service to Man - that fully half of women in Harmuph get it - and then at Captain Martin's explanation of what Flow Ethae entail. Look at how he told us that there are very few people with Flow Ethae that are allowed to remain, how few there are in Harmuph... 25% of the entire population is few? Doubt.

It's as if he isn't aware that Service of Man is Flow-aligned. And certainly we haven't known our mother to read minds... But this discrepancy makes the mystery of Service to Man and Lesser Ethae in general stand out all the more.

Click to shrink...

That same passage also provides for tolerated Flow ethea.

Baring specific approved Ethea, when discovered, they are not allowed to remain in Harmuph for any significant length of time.

Click to shrink...

It's very likely that one of the most common ethea around and one that explicitly ties itself to the service of another is on that list of approved ethea.

 

[actuallynotanegg]

I get the feeling that the secret challenge has something to do with the Maw and finding out some interaction explained by our new source knowledge. Or some integration vector thing. Maybe explaining a previous source related event using new knowledge, something like that.